It's so easy, a caveman can do it!

Last Thursday night, I came down with the flu, just in time for midterm break. I was stuck in my room for the whole weekend, in exception to the Friday night football game at which I had to play in the marching band for. (It was senior night and the last game of the year, so there wasn't much getting out of it, and I still only had a cough.) It was really kind of interesting-in a terrifying way- to watch how my trail of thought almost completely diminished to the basic needs of the moment. All sentence structure entirely dissolved. "Ow. Need Kool-aid." "Cold." This was pushed further along by the on-again-off-again loss of my voice. Then, I lost all urge to converse. Short words and phrases recessed back to grabbing the box of Kool-aid or grabbing my throat. I felt like a caveman. My whole thought process was inexistent, and noone could really understand me. I just didn't possess the energy to do more. Eventually, that Kool-aid started working. My little brother was out of school for almost all of last week because of the flu, and so I tried helping him with his homework. Little by little, I watched my head come back. First, I tackled a coloring portion of a science lab. (The color-coding was insane. I was the only one who could figure it out, so I started playing with that while he was working on this even more complex English assignment.) Then, the English was taking too long, so I helped draw some pictures to definitions he had to look up. Come on- what would you draw for the word "regret"? Finally, I was more on top of things. I started showing my little brother how to do Punnett squares different ways. I evolved back to myself once again. Want Kool-aid. Now!

I'm not a bad girl, I'm just drawn that way...

This morning, I turned on the tv to the Today Show to find an old lady being tazed. (spell?) My first thoughts were: "What sick ...?!?" The clip started over again. Grandma sped through a CONSTRUCTION ZONE, mind you, was screaming and generally being rude to the police officer, throwing her arms around like she was going to attack him, ticked off because he actually doing his job. At first sight, it sounds really terrible that a 70-something year old lady was punished for disobeying the law, but she was being really obnoxious, very unlike someone her age, and most importantly: disobeying the law! Her age does NOT make her invincible. And she's already gotten over $40,000 from lawsuits. For some reason, the officer felt threatened- I would too if I had some crazy old coot wanting to jump down my throat!- and the Today Show cast seemed to ignore that. I hate saying such bad things about those who are older than me, but if they can't act responsibly, then I don't really have much respect for them. The matter could've been solved more calmly on both sides, but it's just a general "no-no" to jump in the face of someone with a badge. And a tazer.

Starblaze: A superhero from out of this world.

Throughout grade school, I went through a couple different phases in which I decided to go all out and try and become whatever career I was fixated on at the moment. In fifth grade, I wanted to be a writer. I had been in young author's since third grade, so by the time fifth grade rolled around, I had really put some thought into the writing business. I wrote all the time. My notebook went with me everywhere I went. From the swingset to the bus, I wrote all the time. My main project was my young author's piece of the year, based off of my favorite cartoon: Sailor Moon. Starblaze was born. Starblaze was a redheaded superhero from a galaxy far away who continuously fought her arch-nemesis _...? (At one point I think his name was Ben Laden, which was my spelling of Bin Laden... The name was all over the news at the time, and I didn't exactly know who/what it was, other than he was the most hated thing on the planet at that time, so it fit until I found a better name.) She and her friends were normal high-schoolers by day, superheroes by night. I didn't win the contest, but I had the greatest time writing it. It was one of the things that I was the proudest of, no matter how lame the attempt might have ended up. I was happy that I got that far. Today's writing is considerably different. Not only do I no longer have the time that I put into my story, I put a lot more thought into how I want to come off. Then, writing was pretty much effortless- I thought it, therefore I wrote it. That's still generally my approach, but now I need to keep looking at it and change it time after time again. Think she could save me now?